By Ranjula Ranasinghe –

There are millions and millions of people worldwide that are entirely against taking vaccines due to many controversial reasons and beliefs. So I am going to debunk some of the most common questions and claims.

Much of the modern Anti-vax movement is linked to a 1997 study published by a British surgeon, Andrew Wakefield (along with 12 co-authors), which ensured the whole propaganda of vaccines increasing the risk of autism. Claiming that their study suggested that the measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccine caused increased cases of British children having autism. His paper was published in the prestigious medical journal, The Lancet.

Do Vaccines Cause Autism?

The study was conducted in the UK; they took 12 children reportedly at the hospital with some sort of developmental problem, i.e., autism. He then asked the children’s parents for their medical history, like since when did they start experiencing the symptoms, etc.

That’s when the parents said that there seemed to be some relationship between the MMR vaccine and autism since they claimed that the autism symptoms began around the same time.

Nine of these children out of the 12 had autism, and 8 of that 9, had parents who believed that the symptoms of their autism had developed after the MMR vaccine was administered. This then caused a ripple effect, where this misinformation was spread rapidly from parent to parent worldwide.

His paper was mainly about the gut. First, Wakefield examined the intestines of these children, and he noticed that a lot of the intestine tissue biopsies had inflammation, so he proposed that the vaccine caused this inflammation. He then thought that through the food the children eat, an unknown protein can now get across the gut (because it’s inflamed) and then affect the developing brain.

However, his paper and all these claims since then have been entirely discredited and filed fraudulent due to significant procedural errors, undisclosed financial conflicts of interest, and ethical violations. Wakefield even lost his medical license, and his paper was revoked from The Lancet.

This so-called “study” itself was just utterly ridiculous. The test wasn’t even via randomly selected children; it wasn’t a scientific study; it was just a description of a small group of children who had taken a vaccine. Such a study wouldn’t even get published in The Lancet nowadays.

Many scientific studies have then been put into this throughout the years. His study was proven false and debunked by 25 international large population research papers involving millions of randomly selected children worldwide for their study. Further, 10 of the 13 authors of this original paper have retracted and refuted their original statements on the suggested link.

Unfortunately, the true cause of autism is still unknown. However, there have been many recent studies that now identify symptoms of autism in children way before they even receive the MMR vaccine. Furthermore, very recent research claims that autism develops in the uterus, so before the baby is even born/vaccinated. So no, vaccines don’t cause autism. (read here, here, here and here)

Is Natural Immunity Better?

Well, yes, sometimes natural immunity is better. After your body undergoes the process of catching a disease and getting sick, your body now has a stronger immunity to that specific disease than a vaccine would. However, this is incredibly dangerous as the chances are not in your favour, so it’s not worth it.

New-born babies are indeed immune to several diseases because of the antibodies they receive from their mother’s breast milk and the thousands of pathogens they’re exposed to as soon as they’re born. Children are given jabs at a very young age since this is when they are most vulnerable to getting sick/dying.

But you see, vaccines protect you from diseases that you don’t have any immunity against, which is the reason why we don’t vaccinate for every single disease out there, just those that are the most dangerous.

For example, if you wanted to gain natural immunity to Measles, you would have a 1/500 chance of dying from your symptoms. Whereas less than 1/1,000,000 have had a severe allergic reaction from taking a MMR vaccine,Which is around ten times less likely than being killed by a lightning strike!

The Vaccine Gives You COVID-19?

No, it just doesn’t. The vaccine doesn’t have any Covid inside it. This misconception probably comes from the traditional technique of vaccinations, where you get injected with an inactive/weakened version of the virus, so your body gets a chance to learn and identify the virus so that the immune system can prepare itself for the same future attack, etc.

This isn’t the case with the new mRNA vaccines; they don’t have any Covid inside them. Instead, they work by training the immune system to recognise the spikes on the coronavirus. Scientists accomplished this by isolating the “spike” producing instruction from the virus’s RNA to make a messenger RNA, which can enter your cells and give those instructions only to build the spikes of the coronavirus, not the entire virus itself.

Can The Vaccine Change Your Genetics/DNA?

Nope. For the vaccine to change your genetics, it would have to go inside the nucleus of your cells; the nucleus contains all your genetic information, your DNA.

The vaccine works on the ribosomes, which is where protein synthesis takes place. So, the vaccine doesn’t even enter the nucleus. Hence it can’t change your genetics.

Do Vaccines Contain Nasty Chemicals?

Yes, vaccines do contain many toxic chemicals, such as Aluminium, Mercury, Formaldehyde, etc. But it’s not the chemicals that matter; it’s the dosage of the chemicals.

Too much of anything is bad for you. Take water for an example: it is an essential requirement for every single living organism, but too much of the compound is toxic and will kill you. A large dose of anything is deadly. And the amount of chemicals in vaccines are negligible.

For example, Aluminium (used to help our immune system work more efficiently) are present in 0.125 milligrams per dose. But, an estimated 30-50 milligrams of Aluminium are taken every day through food and drink by the average person, which is much more than having one vaccination every single day. Even breast milk contains a larger quantity of Mercury than any vaccine out there.

The dose is the poison; the dose is what matters.

Why Should I Get The Vaccine If The Coronavirus Survival Rate Is 99%?

You must be selfless and not think of yourself as an individual, but everyone as one community.

You see, vaccines protect you and everyone else since you can’t spread the disease if you don’t have it. And this is vital since you are essentially protecting those with weaker immune systems, such as infants or the elderly and those who have medical conditions where they are unable to get vaccinated; for example, those who undergo chemotherapy have this problem.

This brings us to a critical concept, “herd immunity”, when more and more people get vaccinated, there is less room in the world for the virus to hang on to, meaning that the virus cannot spread as much as it once used to. That is how we completely eradicated small pox by 1980. . This idea of herd immunity is critical for the vulnerable in our society; it is their best source of protection. Therefore, it is every individual’s social responsibility to get vaccinated.

Another essential aspect to acknowledge is, is that viruses have the potential for exponential growth. I highly recommend watching this video of an Oxford Mathematics PhD graduate explaining the concept; it will give you a clear understanding of the severity. 

Is The Covid-19 Vaccine Unsafe Because It Was Rushed?

This does seem to be a very valid question, as it is unprecedented that a vaccine is available within less than a year of the virus being present. However, keep in mind that we are in an unexpected, catastrophic global pandemic. Scientists all over the globe worked extremely hard, and there were numerous collaborations across many scientists from different countries and organisations.

And the process of creating a vaccine remained the same; they have gone through all the different stages required successfully, proving that there are no devastating side effects.

Furthermore, the new mRNA technology isn’t technically “new”, since it is something that scientists have been researching for decades; it wasn’t just some idea someone thought of in the last couple of months. Now was the correct time to put all those years of scientific research together to form the mRNA vaccine.

Does The COVID-19 Vaccine Contain Microchips?

Yes, indeed, it really does contain microchips, lol just joking; of course it doesn’t!

Firstly, it just isn’t possible for a microchip to be injected with the 22-25 gauge needles used for vaccine injections; the needles are simply too tiny to allow a microchip to pass through.

Secondly, the microchip would have to be stable in liquid form; it would need to be incredibly small, even thousands of times smaller than the smallest microchip in existence. And here’s a question for thought:

Wouldn’t it make more sense if they planted the chip on your phone?

Many people have become addicted to their phones this generation; the first thing you most likely do in the morning as you awake is pick up your phone, then you always carry it around with you throughout most of the day, and you even pay with it nowadays.

Your phone tracks nearly everywhere you go, so wouldn’t them implanting a chip on your phone be more straightforward and more economical?

And why would they even want to place microchips in your body?

To know how much you urinate on average per day? Like, what’s the point??

*Ranjula Ranasinghe – St. Anselm’s College, Wirral